Logan baseball and the Gertz family are synonymous.
Each of the program’s seven championships have their fingerprints all over them.
Though their roles in each haven’t always been the same.
Kevin Gertz, who led the Wildcats to the 2021 title on Saturday, has only been the head coach for four seasons but served as an assistant for an additional 30 years. He was a sophomore on the 1984 team that won the first title in program history.
His father Roger was an assistant to Jeff Massey on the ’84 team and led the Wildcats to titles in 1994, 2000, 2001, 2005 and 2008.
The pair have contemplated retirement following the 2021 season, adding even more meaning to a championship season.
“It’s very special to me,” Kevin Gertz said, drenched in water after Saturday’s 13-0 win over North Marion. “Me and my dad are the only two people in Logan High history to be apart of all seven state titles. He was the head coach of five. He got out when I was coming into high school and went into insurance, but he was there. He came back to be an assistant. He was an assistant in ’84 when we won our first my sophomore year. But the things he did behind the scenes, giving kids individual work, won that. He won all the rest until now.”
They’ve had their high and lows coaching together as all staffs do, but have always found a way to make up. The elder Gertz attributes this to Kevin keeping a cooler head at times when he was often harder than necessary on his players. They’ve balanced each other throughout their years in the dugout.
“I couldn’t tell you some of the stories we’ve had,” the Roger Gertz said. “Heck, I’ve thrown him out of the dugout a couple of times. We were, I think, getting ready to play Jefferson one time and of course I get uptight anyway. When I was younger I put way too much pressure on kids, but he was helping us and he was right out of college. He had mentioned to me one of our players was tight as a banjo string in batting practice and the first ball hit to him, he missed it, and then I went off and our catcher Randy Atkins told coach Jim Willis, who was out in the bullpen, ‘Well there they go again.’ And of course Kevin came in and he said something to me, I fired back at him and he said ‘You do this every time we get in a big game’ and I said ‘Get out out of here’ and he threw the scorebook at me. He said ‘I’m going to go tell them everything that we do’ and I said ‘Go ahead and do it!’ but that was a funny story there.
“But the next day he came back around and I had him back in there, of course he called our pitches for years. He does a great job with that. he’s a great coach. He coaches basketball and he comes back into this. It was tough on him this year, really tough.”
Despite the ups and downs the pair have appreciated the rare feat they’ve accomplished together. They’ve taken the Logan program from a one-time champion to one of the state’s historical powers in a 27-year span.
The pair are largely associated with and attributed the credit for building the program, but the share it with the players coaches who have helped along the way.
“It’s very special,” Roger Gertz said. “It started over 40 years ago. Somebody told me a long time ago to surround yourself with good people and good things will happen and it sure has. The whole time I was a head coach we had good people helping. Jim Willis was a great pitching coach and of course Kevin helped us through the years. Lou Green came along and really taught us a lot of things too this year too.
“We’ve worked hard. Maybe no harder than any other program, but we stress a lot of fundamentals and you can’t win without great players and we’ve had a lot of them. It’s been a great ride. I don’t know how much longer I can go. I’m getting old and I can’t go much anymore. I was telling Lou, he throws a lot of our batting practice, I haven’t thrown the first pitch this year. I don’t know what I’d do if I didn’t stay apart of it. Probably just wither up and die.”
With seven to pick from, Kevin will look back on this title fondly because it might be their last together with the duo staring into the sunset. Both have contemplated retirement after this season, but if this was the final ride it was an appropriate send off.
“I don’t know how much longer we’re going to coach,” Kevin said. “I’ve made a statement that I may need to back up, but this was the most special thing to me. Not because it’s my first as a head coach, but because it could be our last together and it means the world to me. My dad is the greatest coach I’ve ever met in my life and these kids benefitted just being around him.”
Contact Tyler Jackson at tylerjackson@lootpress.com, call him at 304-731-5542 and follow on Twitter @tjack94
